this post was submitted on 09 May 2025
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Everything is being centralized to the My Number (MyNa) system (national ID card, basically). Starting this year, insurance cards are no longer issued but the MyNa card is used. They plan to do driving licenses and the zairyuu card for foreigners as well. As an aside, foreigners' cards expire with their residency which can be a paperwork nightmare for some things, especially with immigration having lately been very slow running over the SoR expiry.
Now, does consolidating that mean that they will have easier access or access at all? That I'm not sure of. I wonder indeed how the government would have known.
Yeah you can already get the drivers license integrated. They're incentivising it by making the renewal fee higher if you want the actual license card. I'm not sure which I will choose next time I renew (or if it will even be an option then).
The one thing I like about the my number card is you can have your alias printed as a memo on the front. Basically, if you can prove you use a katakana name, you can have it added. Mine doesn't include my middle names, which is very useful when needing ID for making a credit card etc.